Over the last few years there has been an explosion in creating electronic versions of books, magazines and newspapers. This electronic textual content is viewed using a specific user device, such as an e-reader or viewed using standard user devices such as personal computers (PCs), laptops, smartphones or tablets. This electronic content is provided to the user through various means: 1) industry standard formatted files such as ePub or pdf, 2) proprietary format files such as Amazon Kindle or Sony's eBeB, or 3) software applications that run on a particular device such as a Time Magazine iOS application for use on an iPod or iPad.
Video, such as may be processed from a file stored in or communicatively connected to a device or from network streamed data received by the device from a remote source, is comprised of “frames.” These frames are processed, in sequence over time, for display of respective images of the scenes. A digital data file or streamed data set of video is generally encoded as two types of video frames, I frames and P frames. The I frames can be decoded without reference to any other frames, but the P frames are decoded with reference to previously decoded I frames and P frames. The I frames usually take considerably more storage then the P frames. Therefore, to save on storage requirements, it is usually desirable to have more of the P frames and fewer of the I frames. The video includes one or more “header” containing metadata which, together with any inputs operative by the metadata, control the sequencing of the frames to display respective images to represent the applicable moving scene of the video. Because the P frames are decoded with reference to previously decoded I frames and P frames, random access to any given frame of the video conventionally requires that previous I frames and P frames must first be decoded.
It would therefore be a significant improvement in the art and technology to provide systems and methods for processing video for display of textual content, such as for electronic versions of newspapers, magazines, books or other purposes, with substantially random selectability of next frame for display from among other frames of the video.